I was so terrified I’d die I made heartbreaking decision in hospital, reveals Max George as he lifts lid on pacemaker op
STRICKEN pop star Max George has told how he typed out his will on his phone in hospital because he feared he would die.
The Wanted singer, 36, was rushed into A&E last month and underwent life-saving pacemaker surgery in Manchester.
Max says his mum Babs saved his life after helping him get emergency treatment for his heart condition.
In his first interview since the terrifying ordeal, Max says he feared he would die in hospital so wrote out his will on his iPhone.
He also tells how the first person he saw after his three-hour surgery was actress girlfriend Maisie Smith, saying: “My heart rate started shooting up. I felt alive again.”
He also spoke of seeing the surgeon’s “bloodied” hands during the operation last month.
Max’s medical drama began when he woke, freezing with blue hands, on December 11 last year.
At the time he was staying with his mum Babs, 63, at her home after returning from a month-long tour of the US.
He recalled: “I hadn’t been feeling myself for a few days, I started feeling a bit rough.
“I couldn’t put my finger on it. I was quite lethargic and stuff, struggling to get out of bed. But I didn’t think it was anything serious.
“Luckily I’d gone around to my mum’s to stay and I woke up and I remember looking at my hands and they were blue, and my arms were a grey colour and I was freezing cold. I struggled to even sit up in bed.”
‘Mum came through the door and gasped’
Max managed to drag himself downstairs where his mother, who works in healthcare, kept a blood pressure monitor.
He said: “My blood pressure was pretty low and so was my pulse and I realised, ‘Something’s not right here.’
“As I did that my mum came through the door and she gasped. She said, ‘What’s wrong? You’re blue. I need to ring the doctor now.’”
Babs drove Max to their GP, where he had a check-up before being sent home.
Undeterred, she insisted he call a doctor friend, who then told him to go straight to A&E.
He said: “At this point I had a panicky feeling, but was also just absolutely knackered.
“I couldn’t move my arms and the worst feeling was I felt like my throat was closing up.
“It felt like someone had their hands around my neck.
“Thank God I stayed at mum’s house – she saved my life.”
Doctors took Max’s pulse at hospital before he was rushed in a wheelchair to the cardiology ward, where he was given some shocking news.
I remember looking at my hands and they were blue, and my arms were a grey colour and I was freezing cold
Max George
He said: “Doctors asked me if I’d heard of a pacemaker as they thought I’d need one.
“They said, ‘There’s something not right with the bottom part of your heart.
“For some reason the rhythm is way off and the signal doesn’t seem to be getting from the top chamber of your heart to the bottom part, the bit that pumps the blood around your body.’ I was in complete shock.”
Max then broke the bombshell news on WhatsApp to Maisie, who was 300 miles away in Kent preparing to go on stage in pantomime.
He told how they made a decision she should continue playing Belle in Beauty And The Beast.
Max said: “I was in the right place and, as much as it was difficult not having her around, and her head was spinning, it was better for her to focus on her work. I had my family there.
“It was really scary, all sorts is going on in your head, and certainly not a place I thought I’d be in at 36.
“I was awake all night, feeling a closing in my throat, I was really struggling to move and had really deep, slow breaths.
“There was nothing that they could do to stop that. I could have lived maybe a few weeks, maybe a few months, but it could have been a few hours. We didn’t know.
“I could have only lived like that being in the state that I was in. I would have been bed-bound. I couldn’t walk.”
The former Strictly star revealed he was the youngest on the ward by at least 30 years, and feared he would die.
So he left instructions on his phone of what to do with his assets in case he did not make it. He said: “That first night I wrote a will, I thought I was going to die.
Thank God I stayed at mum’s house – she saved my life
Max George
“If I could go from being absolutely on top of the world to being told ‘the bottom part of your heart isn’t working’, I kept thinking in my head, ‘Well, what if the top half stops working overnight?’
“When you get told that you really realise what your responsibilities are. I’ve got a partner, Maisie, I’ve got a family.
“I’ve got two little nephews and all of that stuff really comes to the front of it all. I was on the heart ward with about six elderly people, I was at least 30 years younger than them.”
Then, two days after being admitted to hospital, Max’s heart rate had dropped to just 26 beats per minute — compared to a normal measurement of 60-100.
Max said: “Friday December 13 was the worst day that I had there. My heart rate and my blood pressure dropped at the same time, and that was the biggest worry.
“The consultants weren’t there on hand to do the operation in an emergency.
“It was quite close that night, it really felt like my neck was closing up and that’s when the sort of panic really kicked in. I felt like I was dying. It was the worst, I felt emotional.”
On December 15 Max was taken by ambulance to a nearby hospital for a CT scan.
He said: “It was so cold and it was an hour-and-a-half long. So by the time I came out I couldn’t move. I looked like that scene from ET, where he is lying in the river. I could see myself in the reflection of the machine. My arms were blue.
“I had to be transferred by ambulance. I was so cold, I needed my blankets, and my mum had brought me in an electric blanket and little hand warmers.
“That was really tough, because I just couldn’t move my hand. I kept thinking if there was an accident in the ambulance, I was goosed.”
To his relief, Max’s pacemaker surgery was finally set for December 18 – exactly one week after he had been admitted to hospital.
He recalled: “I felt positive when they decided that because at least we had made a decision.
“Now we were working towards something. I was absolutely buzzing. You miss little things like being able to go to the toilet on your own and showering. It sounds like nothing, but after a week it’s a lot.
“My mum brought in a picture of Maisie and Albert, my bulldog, to have on my bedside table and a picture of my Nan, who’s 94. That helped keep me going.”
Max’s operation took three hours but was complicated by collapsed veins, caused by his condition.
That first night I wrote a will, I thought I was going to die
Max George
Although he was conscious, he was heavily sedated with a medication called Midazolam, and witnessed some gruesome scenes.
He said: “The surgery was pretty mental. It was a really odd experience.
“The main problem that they had when they opened me up and were trying to put the leads in was that a lot of my veins had collapsed because my heart rate was so low and I was so dehydrated all the time. I could feel something going on, but not much.
“I could see the surgeon through a window in a sheet over my head and I could see his frustrated expression.
“It’s grim, but I’d look up at him and when he pulled his hands away, his gloves would just be covered in blood, and that I remember thinking, ‘Oh, my God!’ It was morbid. I was s*ing myself. But once they’d started I was excited.
“They finally got the leads into my veins but then they had to get a signal from the technician who has an iPad. “The surgeon asked whether the pacemaker was working. “But the technician said, ‘No signal.’
“At that point I started thinking, ‘What’s going to happen now? Why is there no signal?’”
Eventually the pacemaker kicked into life. And when Max began to focus on his surroundings, he was delighted to see Maisie, who had broken off from her panto duties and dashed up north.
He said: “The first face I saw was Maisie’s and I remember that being really nice — like that was the first time I actually felt like a real person again, and I had a heart.
“I had a proper heartbeat by then as well. My heart rate started just shooting up. So I remember feeling my feet going tingly, because I think obviously the blood started to properly pump around.
“I was like, ‘Holy s, I feel alive again,’ like it was a really nice feeling. It’d been so hard being away from Maisie, but she climbed on the bed, obviously she lay on the other side of my chest to my op, and put her head on me.
“We just had a cuddle for a couple of hours while I talked about football and we treated it like normal. I could feel butterflies again next to her.”
’Hearing other people’s stories is inspiring’
Man City fan Max decided to go public with his ordeal by posting a video for fans from hospital on his social media.
And he was delighted to communicate with other people who had similar conditions.
He said: “As well as watching Manchester City in hospital I spent a lot of time on social media trying to find other people who have been through it.
“And that’s been amazing doing that, because hearing other people’s stories, and what they do is inspiring.
“And it’s people that have got way worse heart conditions than I have, who are doing so well. I’ve already got a new community of people I’m talking to.
“The nurses on the ward were literally incredible, because they were the ones that were with me the whole time.
“One of them took her daughter to see The Wanted a lot so that was nice to talk to her about, just to have a little bit of normality and talk about the stuff I love doing.
“They kept trying to calm my nerves and say I was in the right place if anything happened. I received amazing care and I’m so grateful to them.”
Max was released from hospital on December 23 and is now recovering at his £1.5million Manchester home and enjoying going out for walks with Albert.
- FOR more information and support about heart conditions please visit the British Heart Foundation Charity at www.bhf.org.uk or call 0808 802 1234.
- READ more of Max’s story in The Sun tomorrow.